Harbin_

Harbin transforms into a crystalline wonderland each winter with its Ice and Snow Festival, while summer brings lazy Songhua River picnics and Russian-influenced architecture. Nomads bundle up for the frigid fun, relying on heated co-working spaces and the city's robust internet backbone.

Harbin is the capital of Heilongjiang, China, and the largest city of the province—as well as the second largest urban population (after Shenyang, Liaoning province) and the largest metropolitan population (urban and rural regions together) in Northeast China. The built-up area of Harbin (which consists of all districts except Shuangcheng and Acheng) has 5,841,929 inhabitants, while the total metropolitan population is up to 10,009,854, making it one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. The settlement grew from a small rural fishing village on the Songhua River to become one of the largest cities in Northeast China. Founded in 1898 with the coming of the Russian-built Chinese Eastern Railway, the city first prospered as a settlement inhabited by an overwhelming majority of immigrants from the Russian Empire. In the 1920s the city was considered China's fashion capital, since new designs from Paris and Moscow reached here first before arriving in Shanghai.